Time Enough To Die, page 16
A shadowy human figure slipped along the driveway and into the garden behind Reynolds's house. A traveler? Matilda wondered. There was no reason Reynolds, Linda, and Nick couldn't have been conspiring together. And why not Della and Clapper, too, just to make things even more interesting.
The gate by the road opened and shut behind her. Footsteps splashed and squelched. She knew without turning around that it was Gareth, come to protect her not from ghosties and ghoulies but from all-too-solid miscreants.
"Will I be in your way?” his voice asked.
"Not if you're quiet."
"Right."
Matilda picked her way through the excavated patches and along the edge of the Miller trench. A breath of cold air eddied upward, chilling her face. From her pocket she pulled the spindle she'd picked up her first day in Cornovium. No coincidence, she thought. None at all.
A shape resolved itself from the twilight like a sunlit image projected upon a dark screen. Columns of reddish-brown stone stood in parallel rows below a triangular architrave. Steps mounted upward, skewed just a bit at the side where the foundation stones were of a different shape. Just around the corner of the building a door opened into a low mound. The odor of incense tickled Matilda's nostrils, along with that of horses, bread, and sweat.
Claudia walked toward the temple carrying a basket of daffodils. Her features were drawn tight, as though she was wracked by pain but was too proud to admit it. She climbed the steps and disappeared through the portico into the darkened interior of the temple.
Matilda followed. The stone steps felt like grass and mud beneath her feet. The columns dissolved around her. She found herself in a square chamber lit by high windows and lined with altars. An incense burner emitted a tendril of smoke. Opposite the door stood a heroic bronze statue on a plinth. “Dia Pater” read the inscription. God the Father, Matilda translated. It looked like Charlton Heston playing Moses with a better haircut.
At the god's feet were arrayed several small statues—a leopard, a bull, miniature warriors. Even now, at the beginning of the twenty-first century, those were magnificent pieces. New, unstained by time and larceny, they had been breathtaking. Matilda could hardly blame Reynolds for being bitter about their loss.
Claudia wasn't looking at either the votive statuary or the image of the god. Branwen sat on the top step of a short flight of stairs that led downward to a door closed by a grille. A solitary shaft of light illuminated the chamber within, filling it with the reddish-yellow glow of Celtic gold.
Matilda chanced one more step forward. She knew what Branwen was looking at. Near the door lay a careless pile of gold torcs, no doubt wrenched from the throats of defeated Celts. Some were thick coiled braids, some were chains, and some were fine strands of wire. Some had finials carved in intricate anthropomorphic patterns, others ended with simple knobs. All of them were symbols of the Celts’ dedication to their gods, gods now disgraced by the display of gold as simple booty.
"Why are you sitting there?” Claudia asked quietly.
"I'm spoils of war just as surely as those torcs. Except I'm tainted, and the gold is not.” Branwen extended her right hand and regarded it narrowly.
"Tainted? Not by Marcus, surely."
"No. He acts within right and custom, doesn't he? And he's a good man.... “Branwen's hand clenched. She turned swiftly around. “He doesn't know who I am."
"Of the Iceni, you said."
"My mother was Boudicca's daughter, violated by a Roman soldier. I'm not Iceni, I'm not Roman—I was conceived in degradation and born in shame. If my grandmother had won her war, perhaps I would know peace. But now, like this—I'll find peace only in the next life."
The tendril of smoke wavered in a draft. Claudia said, “I have heard that your priests, your Druids, preach the immortality of the soul. I too believe in a life after death."
"I thought Mithras was a man's god,” said Branwen, nodding toward the underground temple on the other side of the wall from the treasury.
"Marcus follows Mithras. I don't.” With a sigh Claudia sat down on the step beside Branwen, and did not protest when the girl inched away from her. “When I was a child I heard a man called Peter speak, not of a god, but of the son of God. He lived in Judaea, preached compassion and forgiveness, and died to bring us all to everlasting life."
Branwen tilted her head to the side skeptically.
"Like him, Peter was executed for treason, for saying that the emperor is no god. When I was last in Rome I visited his grave. It's become a shrine.” Claudia reached into her basket and pulled out a short knife. With it she scratched a symbol in the stone, a “P” with an “x” and three horizontal lines superimposed on the stem.
A thrill ran down Matilda's back. Claudia had heard the apostle Peter. She had visited his grave. That grave was now deep beneath the Vatican's great basilica, enclosed by a stucco wall on which the symbol she had scratched was repeated over and over.
"And does this god demand sacrifice?” Branwen asked.
"The sacrifice of God is a troubled spirit.” A spasm of pain crossed Claudia's face, quickly quelled and replaced by a thin smile. “And a few flowers.” She spilled the daffodils from her basket across the stone she had scratched. Their cheerful yellow-gold made the gleam of the torcs seem tarnished.
"Pray to your god for me,” said Branwen, and rose to her feet.
"Pray to yours for me, and for Marcus,” Claudia returned.
"I pray to Brighid, Rhiannon, and Keridwen. I pray for an end to this life, and glory in the next. I pray for the speedy arrival of the quarter-day.... “Branwen shook her head, as though she'd revealed too much, and fled the temple.
Claudia sat on the step, caught between the golden spoils and the golden flowers. “Marcus,” she said softly, “I want you back. God forgive me, but I will have you back."
Matilda took a step toward the woman. Daffodils. Sacrifice. The spring quarter day. Beltane. Did Claudia realize what Branwen was telling her?
A hand grasped her arm. Matilda swam upward through currents of memory and desire and broke the surface of night. The air was ice-cold and still. Hard, crisp lights dotted the darkness. Gareth pulled her back from the rim of the Miller trench. “Sorry, you were almost over the edge."
Matilda returned the spindle to her pocket. She tried to speak, croaked, swallowed, and tried again. “Claudia's going to let Branwen go to her death, without telling Marcus, without trying to stop her. Against her faith, perhaps, but it's Branwen's faith that's compelling her."
"Excuse me?"
"Come on, I'll fill you in.” Matilda slipped her arm through his, and leaning together with a subtle and yet unmistakable friction they walked down from the fort. She told him every detail, right down to the smell of the incense.
"Sounds like a proper soap,” Gareth concluded, and added, ever practical, “It's all over and done with. Maybe the bog body is Branwen's, but you're a bit late to save her, aren't you?"
"Yes."
Gareth opened the gate for her and handed her through. “Is the gold still here?"
"Some of it is, I think.... “Matilda stopped dead, pulling Gareth around with her. Someone, a man, was crouching just past the corner of the bowling green wall. A student wouldn't have any reason to hide from them. Neither would one of the constables. Reynolds? Her hyper-extended senses picked up a low chuckle of amusement that didn't remind her of anyone she had met before. A receding chuckle, as the man slipped away into the night.
"What is it?” Gareth asked.
"Someone was hiding behind the wall—no, wait, he's already gone...."
Gareth released her arm and sprinted around the corner. He covered thirty or forty yards down the road before he gave it up and came back. He was hardly breathing any faster. “No joy. I didn't see him."
"Thank you for believing that I did."
Gareth replied with a noncommittal sniff.
Now walking a demure two feet apart, they passed the cottages, crossed the street, and greeted the evening constable as he headed toward the fort. “Mind your back,” Gareth told him. “Someone's messing about out there."
"That's why I'm standing about here instead having a pint in my local,” the man answered, and walked on.
Ashley stood outside the door of the hotel, her blond hair glowing in the light streaming from the windows. Matilda had the distinct impression she was waiting for someone, or at least hoping for someone to appear.
"Aren't you a little nervous out there in the dark?” the girl asked them.
"You have to wonder what's in the dark with you,” Matilda responded.
"Ghosts?"
Had some unguarded phrase tipped Ashley off, Matilda asked herself, or was the girl simply curious? “You know what Samuel Johnson said about the likelihood of ghosts? All argument is against it, but all belief is for it."
"Don't stay out long,” Gareth said. “And don't leave the area just next the hotel."
Ashley nodded. “Don't worry."
The lights in the lobby were blindingly bright. Reynolds's nasal voice echoed from the bar, counterpointed by the saccharine strains of “If Ever I Would Leave You.” Matilda saw Bryan sitting in the sitting room watching television. She wondered suddenly whether she'd been wrong about Ashley going drinking with him. If not him, though, who?
"So if you believe in ghosts they exist?” Gareth asked.
"Probably. But I know what I've seen here. Tomorrow I'll prove it to you."
"Right,” he replied, not quite sarcastic, not quite affectionate.
Matilda offered him a conspiratorial smile, and went upstairs alone.
Chapter Twelve
Tuesday morning dawned clear and bright. The students streamed up the side of the fort, chattering happily in the sunshine. Gareth reserved judgment—one sunny day doesn't make the summer, his grandmother had often said.
He settled his shovel on his shoulder and inspected the pavement beside the bowling green wall. He saw no footprints clear enough for a cast. Matilda might not have sensed anyone hiding there. She might not have sensed last night's episode of the Great Roman Soap. She wouldn't be the first intelligent, perceptive person who'd let her perceptions run away with her.
And yet, Gareth thought, she'd told him every detail of last night's vision, confident she could prove its truth. And she would prove it. It was no longer Matilda's intuition that was irritating, but his growing trust in it.
"Ah, March!” Howard Sweeney was seated in a lawn chair atop the fort, looking like a pharaoh overseeing his slaves. “Are we making any progress?"
At least six students and Ted Ionescu were well within earshot. Gareth answered, “That's for you to say. I'm merely writing up your results."
"And you'll do a smashing job of it, I'm sure. Matilda!"
Matilda emerged from the Miller trench. “Yes, Howard?"
"Are the group leaders doing their paperwork properly?"
"Ashley, Bryan, Manfred,” called Matilda. “Are you doing your paperwork properly?"
"Yes—no problem—jawohl," they answered in chorus.
She gave Sweeney a look that would have withered a rhinoceros. “Anything else I can do for you?"
"No, no, carry on,” he replied with a wave of his hand. “Ted...."
Ionescu sprang to attention.
Matilda disappeared. Gareth followed her into the cool, damp shadows of the ravine. “A pity Sweeney's not the one got the concussion,” he said.
"His offensiveness is a shield,” she replied, “and a darn good one at that. I remember thinking when I first met him, at a conference in Boston six or seven years ago, how little of the real man I could sense through the bravado. I suspect he's protecting something rather small and raw inside. Many hard-working, ambitious people are."
"Right,” Gareth told her, not about to touch that one. “Did you tell Sweeney about—about what you saw last night?"
"More or less. He'll take me seriously when he sees the evidence."
"That's good police procedure. Where shall we start?"
Matilda pointed to a column drum lying just free of the muddy side of the trench, about ten feet from the pit left by the thieves. She'd used string and stakes to mark off a small area behind it. “There. The cellar treasury is on the other side of the foundation wall from the Mithraeum. I'm sure the balk—the trench wall—was originally vertical. Miller was a good archaeologist for his time. But sixty years of erosion and inquisitive feet have broken off the soil at the top and let it accumulate at the bottom."
"In other words, the wall's at enough of a slant we can cut into its base without bringing its top down on our heads."
Matilda took a notebook and measuring tape from her pocket and began taking measurements of the Mithraeum. “You did a nice job cleaning this up."
"Thank you.” Gareth dug carefully into the compacted dirt, keeping the sides straight and the slope above cleared. Every time he spotted so much as a chip of stone or a coin he beckoned Matilda, who rushed forward with her notebook, a collecting box, and a label.
He should be interviewing Dunning and Emma, Gareth told himself. He should be keeping an eye on the travelers. The dig was taking too much of his time and energy. And yet the dig was the focus of the case.... His shovel scraped against stone. “Matilda, here's a whacking great rock."
He stepped aside and took off his jacket. The sun peeked over the rim of the trench and struck silver in Matilda's hair. She scraped at the stone with her trowel and then stood back, brows knit with concentration. Her body moved with fluid precision. Her stance was straight and yet balanced. She made the Queen seem awkward.
Gareth had worried at first that his sudden physical attraction to her was a result of the celibate life he'd led recently. But half the girls on the dig were prettier than Matilda—and, he suspected, more readily available—and he felt only a distant appreciation for them. He valued self-possession in a woman, and Matilda was nothing if not self-possessed.... Not now, Gareth told himself.
Matilda glanced up, catching his eye, and he felt like a little boy caught out with his hand in a sack of sweets. Her smile humored his appetite even as her words modeled patience. “This is the foundation wall of the temple, all right. The smaller Roman stones above it have been robbed out—half the town is built from them. Let's break for lunch, and afterward we'll get several of the kids down here and go in over the top of the stone."
Over the top, Gareth repeated silently. That seemed appropriate.
Sweeney was in fine form during lunch, cleverly disparaging friends, Romans, and countrymen alike, his comments interspersed with no doubt important calls on his cell phone. After the meal, he sent Ionescu back with the students whilst he went to his room to have a nap.
By the time he re-appeared at the dig the entire student body was crowded round the trench. Three mud-spattered boys leaned on their shovels and Gareth perched precariously on a column drum taking pictures. Matilda herself knelt in the cool, oozing gash cut into the side of the trench, Ashley handing her trowels and dental picks like a nurse aiding a surgeon.
"What's all this in aid of?” Sweeney asked.
"Another inscription,” replied Ionescu. “She went straight to it. Dead brilliant, if you ask me."
"I didn't ask you.” Sweeney limped back and forth, trying to get a better view. “Matilda, come out of there and give me a report."
Gareth smothered his grin as Matilda looked upward, her expression sweet as an angel's. “Howard! How nice to have you back! Here's the monogram on the rock. Do you want to tell the students about it, or shall I?"
"Please, carry on.” Sweeney plopped down in his lawn chair.
"This bit of masonry,” said Matilda, “was once the coping stone of a stairway. See the steps, still in place?"
Everyone crowded forward.
"The stone was rolled over, its original face turned down, probably to hide the monogram scratched on it. This means, ironically, that the monogram is in perfect condition, its edges sharp and its surface not weathered."
"If it was inside the temple,” Bryan said, “it'd be protected."
"Yes, you're right. The monogram might have sat face up for any number of years before the temple was abandoned. More likely, though, the stone was turned over while it was new. The Romans were tolerant of most religions, but not Christianity. Because the Christians refused to believe in the divinity of the emperor, and so were a political threat."
Gareth visualized the scene, Claudia and Branwen comparing gods as poor Marcus went about drilling the troops or inspecting bridle bits or mucking out latrines—well no, he was an officer, officers didn't muck.
"At first glance this is a chi-rho symbol,” Matilda went on. “The Greek letter ‘chi', which looks like an ‘x', superimposed on a ‘rho', which looks like a capital ‘p', making ‘Ch-r', the first letters in ‘Christ'. This is why we shorthand ‘Christmas’ to ‘X-mas', by the by. What is especially interesting about this particular symbol, though, is these three little lines to the right of the vertical stem. If you see the letter not as a Greek ‘rho’ but as a Latin ‘p', the lines make an ‘e', giving you ‘Pe’ for the apostle Peter. To whom Christ said, ‘I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven'. Looks like a key, doesn't it?"
Everyone oohed and aahed understanding.
"It's a nice little bit of code for a time of persecution. Historians have found this monogram on dishes, games, manuscripts, tombstones, all sorts of items. But only when it was found on the actual tomb of Peter beneath St. Peter's basilica in Rome did anyone realize its significance."
Sweeney cleared his throat loudly. “And there you are, class, today's lesson in semiotics. If you have time whilst you're in Britain you can view the Christian mosaics at Lullingstone and Hinton St. Mary."
"Semiotics?” Manfred asked. The English-speakers looked just as puzzled.
"The study of symbols,” stated Ashley, with a peculiar little frown.
"Quite so. Let's get to it, there are other interesting bits to uncover, I'm sure.” Sweeney turned to Ionescu. “Ted, work up a way to give partial credit to the students who buggered off. I don't want to get pathetic letters from their advisors pleading extenuating circumstances."
